Westminster Politics

Thank god the jeering and cheering is back at PMQs. It was in real danger of becoming an actually useful debate over the last few weeks, glad we nipped that one in the bud.
 
finneh said:
As I said before as a proportion of income it's a much larger increase for those earnings less "it would disproportionately help the lowest in the group as for example someone earning £20k per annum would see their net salary increase by more than 8% whereas someone on £40k would see less than a 4.5% rise."

I'll reiterate again also I'd be in favour of this alongside a cut in VAT, a cut in fuel duty, cuts in particularly lower council tax bands etc. Cutting these regressive taxes would naturally target the poorest.

Finally the middle classes (Inc nurses, teachers etc) who'd benefit from the £1500 tax break would spend this money which would have the effect of boosting the economy. This would create jobs for the poorest who are likely to be disproportionately effected by Covid job losses and would cause other tax revenues to increase (VAT due to money spent, income tax due to greater levels of employment, stamp duty as more people would buy homes, corporation tax due to greater business profits etc).
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Fair enough. I mean lower taxes are a great intention and have obvious benefits but the reality there is a quid pro quo.

It's just not a very efficient way of providing tax relief.

The expense of increasing the personal allowance since 2010 has been offset by regressive spending cuts to fund it in reality. So the govt has been giving with one hand and taking with the other for a lot of lower income people, but higher earners less reliant on govt services don't really get the drawback.
 
Eugenius said:
Fair enough. I mean lower taxes are a great intention and have obvious benefits but the reality there is a quid pro quo.

It's just not a very efficient way of providing tax relief.

The expense of increasing the personal allowance since 2010 has been offset by regressive spending cuts to fund it in reality. So the govt has been giving with one hand and taking with the other for a lot of lower income people, but higher earners less reliant on govt services don't really get the drawback.
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I think the majority of tax reliefs that disproportionately help the poorest would have the byproduct of benefiting others who're better off. Whether that be VAT reductions, council tax reductions for lower bands, fuel duty reductions, personal allowance increases etc.

Likewise a negative tax rate combined with a tapered basic income (I mentioned before a £10k basic income reduced by £1k for every £4k earned, but these figures were merely for simplicity) would target the poorest, but also as a byproduct benefit lower-middle earners.

Fundamentally if your deeply cynical about the efficiencies of government spending and how it fails year after year to help the poorest, then a different approach is worth a try (and after reading the likes of Friedman, Sowell, Smith etc I think tax relief is the way forward).

Let's be honest if the NHS did not exist and we were talking about ways of targeting policy to help the poorest, this would also be "not very efficient". Providing subsidised healthcare to millionaires is clearly inefficient. Likewise providing subsidised education to the children of millionaires. Likewise subsidised transport to wealthy bankers. Likewise subsidised bin collections.

Whilst I'm not a millionaire I find it bizarre that the current system inefficiently offers me subsidised services that I neither want nor need; money that could be allocated far more efficiently to the poorest.

That along with the terrible service provided in the majority of public sector run enterprises is why I try to avoid using subsidised services.
 
Gotta love the Gammons coming out in force in anger at Dominic Raab getting asked any tough questions on breakfast news today.

Also perhaps it’s perfectly normal for a Foreign Secretary not to read a report regarding foreign intervention in our democracy:

 
Tbf I don't think Raab can read. Remember, this is the guy who 'didn't quite understand' how important the Dover-Calais crossing was to UK trade when he was Brexit Secretary.
 
redtilded121 said:
he also thinks taking the knee comes from game of thrones
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Yep the title missed out the best bit.

Our foreign secretary thinks taking the knee comes from game or fecking thrones.

But yeah, there's no problems in the UK and all that.
 
“You know nothing, Dom Raab.”
 
Why is there such a sudden rush from the Right to get kids back in schools?

Seems to me if they really were worried from the off, they could have developed this tutoring scheme in preparation.

They surely aren't worried about the repercussions on how this will look on the Government in a few years times, as they'll just use the evil Unions narrative?
 
Vernon Philander said:
Why is there such a sudden rush from the Right to get kids back in schools?
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All Tory roads lead to money, sooner or later. So my guess is: a) they're pushing for this because it would mean people are, in theory, free to return to work, and b) because it would give the public a sense that everything is back to normal; and therefore safe (to shop and work).
 
Tory MP tries to show how much he understands modern culture, gets it wrong. It might be depressing but it's not new.

How did The Thick of It put it again?

"Disconnected to the point of autism."
 
Vernon Philander said:
Why is there such a sudden rush from the Right to get kids back in schools?

Seems to me if they really were worried from the off, they could have developed this tutoring scheme in preparation.

They surely aren't worried about the repercussions on how this will look on the Government in a few years times, as they'll just use the evil Unions narrative?
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Im not sure what % of the workforce are parents to children who cant be left at home - but Id guess perhaps 50%

Based on the info in here that probably seems not a million miles out
https://www.ons.gov.uk/employmentan...yment rate,without dependent children (73.5%).

Given that kids cant stay with grandparents and childcare is generally not available combined you are essentially taking 25% of the workforce out of action - at a time when the furlough support to companies is about to be reduced... esssentially if the schools dont open families will have to choose which parent quits their job and most probably most families cant cope with loosing one wage easily
 
finneh said:
The personal tax allowance is pretty straight forward to understand unless I'm missing some hidden treasure that you wanted to enlighten me on?.
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Raising the personal tax allowance benefits the wealthy more than the poor. It’s also frighteningly expensive.

Yet it’s beloved by right wing folks like yourself as it feels like you’re helping the poor.

Conservatives will often quote it as a ‘Rising tide lifts all boats’ scenario. It’s nothing like that. their fall back position is normally “But everyone still has more money, what more do you want”.

Thirty seconds of critical thought gets you your answer.

But you’ll probably parrot your old stance for a lifetime. Because you don’t want to change. Because the current system sees you doing well.
 
FireballXL5 said:
Tbf I don't think Raab can read. Remember, this is the guy who 'didn't quite understand' how important the Dover-Calais crossing was to UK trade when he was Brexit Secretary.
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Nor did he read the Belfast agreement as Brexit secretary. He also described the working class in the UK as "amongst the worst idlers", doesn't believe in human or economic rights and described the desire to support the vulnerable as a "childish wishlist".
He's a total cnut and either a fecking idiot or dangerously negligent to boot.
 
Vernon Philander said:
Why is there such a sudden rush from the Right to get kids back in schools?

Seems to me if they really were worried from the off, they could have developed this tutoring scheme in preparation.

They surely aren't worried about the repercussions on how this will look on the Government in a few years times, as they'll just use the evil Unions narrative?
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There are kids who presumably have parent (s) doing 9-5 working from home jobs who are probably very neglected right now. Even middle class parents from Tunbridge Wells (maybe especially so as the working class are less likely to be able to WFH and are probably off work entirely)

Don't assume just because one is on the right they have no soul.
 
Eckers99 said:
Tory MP tries to show how much he understands modern culture, gets it wrong. It might be depressing but it's not new.

How did The Thick of It put it again?

"Disconnected to the point of autism."
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I think it's more sinister than ignorance. It's a deliberate attempt to belittle and delegitimise the protest. He may be a moron but he knows full well taking the knee will not have originated from Game of Thrones. It's his way of saying 'look how silly you all are, I really do not give a feck about your movement'.
 
Ubik said:
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The app served its purpose of letting them line the pockets of Cummings mates, so now they can make the move that everyone knew they would eventually to something that will actually work.
 
vodrake said:
The app served its purpose of letting them line the pockets of Cummings mates, so now they can make the move that everyone knew they would eventually to something that will actually work.
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Yeah, I want to know how much public money they just pissed against a wall for no good reason.
 
BobbyManc said:
I think it's more sinister than ignorance. It's a deliberate attempt to belittle and delegitimise the protest. He may be a moron but he knows full well taking the knee will not have originated from Game of Thrones. It's his way of saying 'look how silly you all are, I really do not give a feck about your movement'.
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Yeah, maybe I was so keen to quote TTOI that I gave them/ him too much credit. The 'callous cnut in blundering oaf's clothing' look is one of their specialities after all.
 
Eckers99 said:
Yeah, maybe I was so keen to quote TTOI that I gave them/ him too much credit. The 'callous cnut in blundering oaf's clothing' look is one of their specialities after all.
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Don’t get me wrong, TTOI is great and Raab deserves no credit. He’s the worst of all the leading Tories imo and that’s saying something. But unlike his Dover-Calais comment, this time I think he is deliberately showing off his ignorance. It’s showing he doesn’t know the history of the protest because he doesn’t think it’s worthy of his time or attention. It’s displaying contempt for it by pretending that for all he knows it may as well have come from a TV show.
 
BobbyManc said:
Don’t get me wrong, TTOI is great and Raab deserves no credit. He’s the worst of all the leading Tories imo and that’s saying something. But unlike his Dover-Calais comment, this time I think he is deliberately showing off his ignorance. It’s showing he doesn’t know the history of the protest because he doesn’t think it’s worthy of his time or attention. It’s displaying contempt for it by pretending that for all he knows it may as well have come from a TV show.
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I dunno. Based on Grayling et al it's hard to know where the incompetence ends and cnutishnes begins.
There's no doubt Raab is one of the very worst though. Shame we don't get to see him blubbing his way through Covid briefings anymore to be honest. That showed a genuine brittleness very close beneath to the veneer of arrogance.
 
I think it's worth noting that Kaepernick decided to take the knee based on advice from Nate Boyer. Boyer took the decision to stand for the national anthem. Kaepernick had no issue with that. Pressuring people to take the knee is counterintuitive, surely. Raab really didn't help himself with the GoT comment though. :wenger:
 
UnrelatedPsuedo said:
Raising the personal tax allowance benefits the wealthy more than the poor. It’s also frighteningly expensive.

Yet it’s beloved by right wing folks like yourself as it feels like you’re helping the poor.

Conservatives will often quote it as a ‘Rising tide lifts all boats’ scenario. It’s nothing like that. their fall back position is normally “But everyone still has more money, what more do you want”.

Thirty seconds of critical thought gets you your answer.

But you’ll probably parrot your old stance for a lifetime. Because you don’t want to change. Because the current system sees you doing well.
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I've already changed my political stance over the past 15 years from a more authoritarian and economic right wing to a more libertarian and economically right wing (closer to old fashion liberalism) so I'm not averse to change. I wonder whether you've ever changed political views or like the majority of the left do you not need to change because you're obviously right morally and intellectually?

The truth is what I believe in stems from doctrines written about by many Nobel Prize winning economists so it isn't "wrong" by any means, just as tax and spend leftist economics isn't "wrong" (apart from in my opinion of course).

I've read both sides and agree with the former rather than the latter. I believe that governmental inefficiencies mean even at the height of the laffer curve in terms of taxation there will be nowhere near enough tax to account for inequalities and inefficiencies. The solution in my view is to give cash to the poorest (aforementioned tapered basic/negative income) and let private sector efficiencies mean their money will not only go much further but the poorest will have the pride in using that investment in them to rise out of their backgrounds. Rather than taking their money and them forcing them to go through often inhumane means to get it back.

This is why I avoid as much tax as possible, whenever possible, but also give to charity (so it's nothing to do with selfishness).

I'd also be interested about your thoughts on the efficiencies of subsidising the education and health (amongst other things) of millionaires?
 
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finneh said:
I've already changed my political stance over the past 15 years from a more authoritarian and economic right wing to a more libertarian and economically right wing (closer to old fashion liberalism) so I'm not averse to change.
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Gosh how radical
 
Pexbo said:
Gosh how radical
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The difference between libertarianism and authoritarianism is no lesser a change in ideology than changing from left to right or vice versa (obviously not economically).
 
finneh said:
The difference between libertarianism and authoritarianism is no lesser a change in ideology than changing from left to right or vice versa (obviously not economically).
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Do you think you associate more with classical libertarianism now or do you think modern libertarianism associates more with you?
 
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